Nun resigns after vote fraud accusation

Mar. 11, 2013

An absentee ballot box at the Hamilton County Board of Elections / Enquirer file photo

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Three people – including a nun and a longtime poll worker – are facing charges related to improper voting.

The three are the first charged out of a Hamilton County Board of Elections’ investigation that found a handful of people improperly cast at least two ballots that were counted in the November 2012 election.

“Elections are a serious business and the foundation of our democracy,” Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters said. “... individual votes may not seem important, but this could not be further from the truth.”

Those charged are:

• Russell Glassop, 75, Symmes Township, illegal voting, a charge that carries up to 18 months in prison. He is accused of voting on behalf of his deceased wife. She requested an absentee ballot, but died before the ballot was mailed.

• Melowese Richardson, 58, Madisonville, eight counts of illegal voting, charges that carry up to 12 years in prison. Richardson – a poll worker when the fraud took place – is accused of voting twice in the November presidential election and on behalf of relatives in various elections. Board of Elections Director Amy Searcy said Richardson won’t be asked to come back.

• Sister Marguerite Kloos, 54, Delhi Township, illegal voting, a charge that carries up to 18 months in prison. Kloos, who resigned last week as The College of Mount St. Joseph’s Dean of the Division of Arts and Humanities, told investigators that she filled out an absentee ballot for Sister Rose Marie Hewitt, another nun who died a month before last November's election. Kloos has agreed to plead guilty, Deters said.

None of the three could be reached for comment.

Three additional cases remain under investigation, Deters said.

The investigation started with 85 or 90 cases, the vast majority resolved with no impropriety found.

Some questions linger about 50 people who cast an absentee ballot and then voted on a provisional ballot, said Hamilton County Board of Elections Chairman Tim Burke, a Democrat.

Democratic Board of Elections members say there is nothing wrong with that because only one vote counted. The process worked to make sure each person only got one vote, they say. Republican Board of Elections members argue there is a conflict in state law about whether that’s allowed.

While the number of cases being examined is minuscule compared with the nearly 422,000 votes cast countywide last fall, it is sizable in terms of vote fraud. The last vote fraud prosecution in Hamilton County is believed to have occurred in 2008.